Comments on: A Paladin lacking in Wisdomhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/
A blog for people with a critically rational individualist perspectiveSun, 02 Aug 2015 19:30:29 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.2.3By: Plonkhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221705
Sun, 03 Jul 2011 15:21:25 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221705I was also a Grammar School pupil in the early to mid 60’s and I am pretty damn sure I wouldn’t have passed the 11 plus if I hadn’t been able to pass this test.
I remember a few years back my youngest was having trouble with fractions. I sat down with her and showed her how I was taught. She got quite worried and kept telling me they were not allowed to do it that way.
I persevered and she never looked back.
What I don’t understand is why kids are not taught in a way that is known to work instead of constantly trying out new ways of doing things. I can only assume that the old ways are too difficult for most teachers to grasp.
]]>By: Natalie Solenthttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221704
Sat, 02 Jul 2011 07:54:45 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221704Steve,

Yes – I get the impression fractions are taught in primary school and then scarcely touched again. When Imperial measurements were in use they got constant revision, particularly for boys doing metalwork and so on; with metric measurements they do not.

(Correction: my son, having seen this, has slightly indignantly said that he has done fractions in secondary school, although they are not done as a topic in themselves, but as part of probability or some other topic. OK, exaggeration above – but he has to admit that he needed practice at home to reinforce the sketchy treatment in school.)

Oddly, you might have found that your innumerate fellow students would have had little trouble with cancelling “x” top and bottom of an algebraic fraction. The problem really is just *numbers*. A lot of quite good students seem not to connect algebraic fractions with the 1/2 + 1/3 they did in primary school. Of course that makes them weak in algebraic fractions, but they can do them most of the time. Strange.

]]>By: Stevehttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221703
Fri, 01 Jul 2011 22:01:15 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221703This does remind me of sitting in a mathematics refresher for Masters students at a university in Northern England three years ago. One individual (with the obligatory ‘good first degree in science’, found difficulty with the concept:

10/10 = 1

Yes, for those of you who think you have had a nasty turn, that is ten divided by ten equals one. Admittedly there were a few numbers above and below the line. It was something like:

148 x 0.65 x 10/ 45600 x 10

But when the two tens were struck out the individual thought that it was some sort of fiddle. He was joined by three or four others similarly mystified. This was not a joke or a spoof, I knew them and they were hopelessly innumerate.

Six months later all of them received their second science degree at a British university.

P.S I did my 11+ in 1957. That alone would probably have given me a pass in the maths exam.

]]>By: geekhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221702
Fri, 01 Jul 2011 12:40:33 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221702Well, wisdom is the paladin dump stat in the latest editions, so makes sense…
]]>By: Choeyhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221701
Thu, 30 Jun 2011 03:24:20 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221701You have the wrong types of questions. The more typical question would be: An average tree in a particular forest yields 100 board feet of lumber. There are 95 trees in the forest. How do the squirrels and bunnies feel about the evil loggers chopping up their homes?
]]>By: llamashttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221700
Wed, 29 Jun 2011 19:15:37 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221700RAB makes good points.

Back in the day, a teacher didn’t need, perhaps, quite so much force of personality to maintain order. The ingrained culture of outward respect and deference for all teachers, rigidly enforced, could cover for quite a few personal shortcomings.

The ‘streak of eccentricity’ remark brought it all flooding back.

We had one master who was internationally-renowned in the art of Scottish country dancing. To watch this guy, in his 40s, prancing around in full Highland dress, was a sore trial to the legions of teenage boys forced to both watch and participate (it was a PE requirement, solely due to his personal involvement), but the Code meant that we had to keep our thoughts to ourselves, on pain of durance vile.

One headmaster was famous for his sartorial peculiarities, on a famous occasion pulling up a boy for wearing trousers wide enough to make ‘a skirt for a good-sized wench.’ You do not say this sort of thing to 13-year-old boys – not if you want to earn their respect, you don’t.

One master taught art & architecture classes in spite of the fact that he was blind as a bat – he’d taught the same class for so long that he had it all in his mind’s eye.

Ah, the dear, dead days.

llater,

llamas

]]>By: RABhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221699
Wed, 29 Jun 2011 17:59:16 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221699Ta Alisa. I wasn’t really going to bother to come back and quibble with natalie, but my point remains that you are not a good teacher unless you can maintain your pupil’s attention and concentration.

Knowing your subject is fine, as is being able to impart information clearly and concisely in perfect conditions, but if you can’t do it for 30 plus ( I was taught in classes of 30+) fidgety unruly eleven year olds (and this was 1963, we were angels compared to what kids are like now) then you are no teacher. Suited to higher education perhaps, where people actually want to learn, but not to the conscripts of our Compulsory Education system.

I was thinking of my first Maths teacher in Grammar school when I wrote. He was a Cambridge graduate, so knew his stuff and in dead silence was a good communicator, but nasty little animals that all kids are, we instinctively knew how to wind him up, and would make silly little jokes that would push him into apoplectic rage. We spent half of all our maths lessons that first year, learning little and standing to attention by our desks, while he went purple in the face and threatened to chuck us all out the window.

It helps if a teacher has a streak of eccentricity too. We had a Geography teacher who was nicknamed Eggy, bald as a coot, looked 108, with the weirdest Welsh accent you ever heard. He wasn’t 108 of course, probably early 50’s. He had been a Commando during WW2 and got blown to hell, had more steel plates in him than a steam engine, but his delivery of the subject was just spellbinding, you never knew what he was going to come up with next. So ladies and gents I give you one of his most famous “Eggyism’s, which explains in one pithy memorable line, all you will ever need to know about the climate and topography of the Subcontinent…

“Remember bwoys, the Himilayas make India warmer than it really is”

]]>By: Alisahttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221698
Wed, 29 Jun 2011 13:03:58 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221698Another one who survived calculus – there seems to be a whole bunch of you here. I’m green with envy.

Natalie, I have to take RAB’s POV here: good teaching is not just about the ability to explain, it is also (if not mostly) about the ability to incite interest. When that happens, there remains little need to impose discipline. I am not saying none, but little.

]]>By: wh00pshttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221697
Wed, 29 Jun 2011 12:46:56 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221697Our best teacher was drunk, mostly, and he taught maths.
Before the age of 14 or 15 I was terrible, and just resigned that I couldn’t ‘do’ maths. After one year in his class, I was moved into the higher maths group and am now the holder of an HNC in electronics engineering.
]]>By: MarkEhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221696
Wed, 29 Jun 2011 10:58:40 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221696I remember two teachers from my youth (it was a long time ago – I’m doing well):

A went into teaching after an academic research career in his subject. He was undeniably brilliant in that subject, but totally unable to explain it to a class of 15 year olds seeing it for the first time

B went into teaching despite what seems to have been an indifferent degree (at best). His grasp of his subject was far less than that of A, but by the end of each lesson we each knew as much about it as B himself. That proved enough to pass the O level.

]]>By: 'Nuke' Grayhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221695
Wed, 29 Jun 2011 07:01:41 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221695I will not take the test, because I fear it is a trap- any answer will be ‘judged’ as acceptable (nobody can fail!), and I will be immediately drafted into the system as a British teacher! (After all, I can ‘interact’ with the keyboard- what else is required?)
]]>By: Perry de Havillandhttp://www.samizdata.net/2011/06/a-paladin-lacki/#comment-221694
Tue, 28 Jun 2011 22:16:40 +0000http://192.168.200.139/?p=14130#comment-221694Hmm’s comment is the immediate thread winner
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